On Fire for All Things Christ

Posts tagged ‘Bad Teacher’

Okay, I had some difficulty with the title of this posting because after writing and then reading it, I address a few different issues here that may not fully make sense to you. But, I’m going to leave it as is, since that’s how the Lord provided it to me. I’m not a movie critic by any means, so this critique is rooted purely from the rise in my spirit.

In an effort to spend more time with family (aside from my occasional home visits) I recently agreed to join my mom in watching the movie Bad Teacher. I don’t go to the movies often and frankly, I didn’t have big expectations of this one, but I thought it would be fun to see. Now having seen the movie, I don’t recommend it to anyone! Sadly, like with many other current movies, I find myself questioning the things that society deems acceptable. Are movies like Bad Teacher really the type of entertainment and humor that hits peoples funny bone?

There is however, one thing I want to address that I haven’t been able to shake off my mind – the character portrayal of Elizabeth, aka the bad teacher. I’m left with questions like: Do women really live (or want to live) in the way that this movie showed Elizabeth to be? Does the character of Elizabeth really represent the type of demeanor that women are coming to? Is this amusing and attractive to men? Do women want to act this way? Surely this was just “acting” by every sense of the word!

Elizabeth, played by Cameron Diaz, is no doubt feminine by outward appearance, but the inward evidence is quite the opposite. In Bad Teacher, Elizabeth’s lifestyle, language and personality present a grotesque, culturally-growing, accepting persona of a 30-somethings woman with bad 20-somethings typical male behavior. Forget that the role of Elizabeth is a teacher. Bad Teacher is the bad portrayal of a woman from the eyes (in this case the writer of the script) of a man that surely doesn’t know a thing about women! The script writer merely fed his male notion of a fantasy girl by merging the personality of his fraternity buddy inside a hot woman body. By every character sense, Elizabeth is repulsing! Do women really live, talk and act like that? Men have become very vulgar in language, but to see that depicted in a woman is absurd and disgusting in every way.

You may think I’m taking this character thing way too seriously. It’s just a movie you say. It’s for kicks and giggles. Well, the thing that bugs me is that others will see this movie and mimic the behavior, and this is the way that society will keep slipping on its values and ethics. Just one movie out of myriads that play the same card. Bad teacher portrays a bad message of what is considered acceptable women behavior and I’m sure I’m not alone in this opinion. (And just in case you are wondering, I don’t agree with that behavior in men either.)

The reason this stirs my “righteous anger” so much is because for me, the further I find myself drawing toward the things of God, the more repulsed and less tolerant I become to such vulgarity and cultural shifts away from Godless things. I don’t like women portrayed with ugly male personas! That’s not okay and I refuse to accept it as a cultural norm. The blurring of lines between men and women is being pushed more and more together like the same ends of a magnet, but God did not create us to be the same. For how long will society give power to the defeated forces of the devil who is pushing the two together?

It makes me think of people asleep and unaware of things coming, of the trap you are falling into day by day without being aware because all others around you are in the trap with you. It’s a way for the enemy to keep you in death, in meaninglessness. I say, wake up sleeper to the things that matter, to the things and ways of God. The enemy has you in a trap of surroundings that aren’t true nor right. You are blinded by the devil’s deception of what he wants you to think life should be. He’s blinded you by keeping you away from God’s truth and words and in the meaningless. Lazily you sit in chairs watching and soaking in the deception. Wake up, wake up and see the lies binding you!!! It’s like being woken up from the devil’s matrix. I haven’t seen the movie, The Matrix, in years, but if that is relate-able to you, then that’s what it’s like. You live in the lies of the devil’s matrix. Wake up from it, be unplugged from it, and become a fighter against it. That is what it’s like to live like living for the Truth of the Lord.

I know I mentioned a lot of things here and they progressed from one thing to something else. That was not intended, it’s just what was stirred in my heart as I wrote. My prayer is that you may be awakened from the meaninglessness of the life the enemy is tangling around you and see the trap he’s got you in. Awaken your soul to be about more than kicks and giggles to entertain you. Know the repulsion that angers the heart of the Lord. May the Lord awaken you.

As it is said in scripture: Ephesians 5:14-16 … “Awake, sleeper, And arise from the dead, And Christ will shine on you.” Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil.